I said goodbye to a dear friend last week. This friend has been with me through the turbulence of the last six months. Her bubbly personality will be missed. It was hard to say goodbye as I scraped the jar and dumped my sourdough starter down the drain. I will miss her. She was always there when I needed her. She made me feel safe in these troubled times.
Next month, on October 14th, I will say goodbye to my house, my furniture, and virtually everything I own. I sold my house as a turn key vacation rental property and I am moving on to new and better things. I have absolutely no idea what that looks like, but I must say there is a certain sense of freedom and excitement not knowing. I will start my adventure by staying with a good friend in West Kelowna where we will concentrate on drinking wine and playing pickleball. Then, on December 4th, she too becomes homeless as she also sold her home recently, and we are heading off to Tuscany (Italy) - Ville di Corsano to be exact.
It is a lovely villa that sits atop a hill overlooking the Tuscan hills and vineyards. At night you can see the lights of nearby Siena - a gorgeous, historic city. Normally I would only go somewhere warm in the winter, but this year due to covid19 I wanted to go somewhere where there is good free public healthcare, good food, and most importantly, where the wine is prolific and inexpensive. My friend Judith and I will be completing our advanced sommelier courses while there. I don't actually want to work as a sommelier. I did work in a winery this summer - for three days - but I am just not cut out for working under a manager that is younger than my kids and dumber than my big toe. Really, I just want a better understanding of wine. I have an active brain and it needs to keep busy so this is a strategy that combines my need for learning with my passion for good food...because good food is always better with good wine.
While I am in Italy it is my intent to spend much time pondering my next step in this ever changing two star retirement plan. I do not think I want to flip houses anymore and while I am intrigued by the idea of building a tiny (not tiny on wheels, but small in size) house, I need something more fulfilling. I have ignored one of my driving needs for far to long: contribution. I need to find a way to make a meaningful contribution to the world and I think it is time to add that to the retirement plan. I hope to do some networking, and talking to old friends to see what doors, if any, might be open for me to use my skills towards some cause. I understand now that retirement is more than just not working and travelling - at least not for me. I need more than laying on a beach. I need an opportunity to grow and to give.
It is for that reason I have sold my vacation rental business. I have my last customer coming this weekend in fact. It has been a surprisingly busy summer. Staycationers have kept me busy so at least I am going out with a bang. Last week however, I almost went out with a bust - and yes - this is the disaster I referred to on Facebook last week! I had several days between customers so I decided to have Joel my son and his wife over for a really nice dinner. I had cleaned the vacation suite and sanitized everything, but needed to use the kitchen and dining room for the dinner party. As we were starting our third course of food, and second bottle of wine I saw a car drive up and park in front of the house. I said aloud, "I wonder who that is?" but as I said it I got a knot in my stomach and I knew. I leapt up and ran to the vacation rental calendar, and to my horror realized I had screwed up my dates by a day.
"Quick! Grab the dishes, grab the food - oh my god what have I done? Everything - quick - get it out of here! Joel you move the stuff, Rachel you start cleaning. I will stall them!" I went outside and said hello and mentioned there would be a small delay due to a "wee disaster" and could I offer them a lovely 2014 Pinot Noir to enjoy while sitting on the deck? I gave them a tour of the yard, we talked about wine, and before long I got the nod from Joel that all was well. I let out a sigh of relief, and as they entered the house I entered the disaster that was my laundry room full of food and dirty dishes! That's when I remembered that we were using THEIR dishes! To make a long story short, the kids and I finished our meal sitting on my bed downstairs, and over the next two days I was finding cutlery and plates in very strange places. As I returned them to the people upstairs - apologizing for the lack of cutlery in their drawer and alluding again to the "disaster" (which I am pretty sure they thought had to do with plumbing) I had my customers begging for three days to tell them what had happened. I joked with them and said, "Not until after you post your review."
It all worked out but horrified me nonetheless to think that I had been so flighty. The last number of months have been rather stressful and perhaps I should cut myself some slack. I have been through a marriage breakup, a very bad flare requiring starting new medication that requires weekly injections and makes me nauseous, selling my house, discovering I had rented my now sold house to two people for the same space at the same time (that's another horror story for another day), and of course covid19. As we speak I am self monitoring as my son Joel - a teacher - is at home with a cold/fever awaiting his covid test tomorrow. Given all that has been going on I am actually surprised I haven't forgotten my name! On a positive note I have lost five pounds without even trying!
Losing a little weight before Italy is probably a good thing...all that pasta is bound to add up to a significant weight gain. Christmas season in Tuscany is really eating season.
They don't just have Christmas dinner, holiday meals include Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and the 26th of December – Santo Stefano... three days in a row of culinary delights! According to the Discover Tuscany website after the above holiday meals there is "a reprieve of 4 days before everyone is back at the table for the Cenone di Capo d'Anno – the “big dinner” for New Years Eve – many times based only on fish. This would then be followed by lunch on New Year's Day. And then 5 days later the last event of the season, the Epiphany and the the arrival of the Befana, an ugly old witch who would deliver holiday gifts" and of course, more food!
It all sounds like just what I need.
.png)
